February 2011

02/24/2011

There are many ways to tell a story. Musicians tell stories by evoking the emotions of an experience through the melodies they compose; painters tell tales with brushstrokes and juxtaposition of colors; writers take their readers on journeys with their masterful use of language. Scrapbook designers capture snapshots of time and combine select photographs, papers, words and elements of design to artfully take the viewer across the rich landscape of their memory-keeping.

I could literally write a novel about my family's plight as refugees of the Hungarian Revolution of 1956 and our adventures of adjusting to a new life in America, but as a scrapbook designer, I don't have the luxury of using hundreds of words in my storytelling. I must find the right balance of multiple disciplines to tell my story in a concise, artistic and convincing way so that my viewers feel the essence of the experiences of my family's life as they view the little snippets of it.

In the double-page layout above, I illustrate the Farkas family's first two years in their newly adopted home...not an easy accomplishment in such a limited amount of space, but it is a great example of effective storytelling. The layout opens with a photo taken by my father of the Statue of Liberty...the universal symbol of American freedom. Although the photograph was actually taken many months after we arrived in the US (we landed on American soil by plane), the image of the boat approaching the magnificent icon -full of hopeful Hungarian transplants immediately sets the tone for the story. The words across it: "A Place to Belong...Refuge in a Storm...Cozy...Safe Haven...Retreat...Home" -tell it all.

As the eye moves down the left page, it scans an old post card of the Americus Hotel, in Allentown, Pennsylvania, where we stayed until a more permanent home was found. The little tag sports a photo of Camp Kilmer, New Jersey, an old abandoned army barracks that was spruced up to receive and process the Hungarian refugees as they arrived in the states. The tag points to the refugee identification photos of the exhausted, anguished parents and their four confused children. -How different this family portrait is from the one on the previous page (see Scrapbooking a Heritage Album: Part 7).

The viewer is then taken on a visual journey of the family as it heals and finds solace in their new home. We see the family's duplex in Allentown, with Peter's first car, a classic Oldsmobile, and we see early family photos taken on Sundays after church. The quote in the center of the left-hand page reminds us of what is truly important: "The Best Thing to Hold onto in Life is Each Other".

These photos were taken frequently to assure relatives back in Hungary that we were doing just fine. The clothes on our backs may have been from the Salvation Army, but they were always clean and well-pressed. The blossoms of the flower -cut out of patterned paper (a recurring theme throughout the album) -points to the family's second home in Highland Park, New Jersey, where we moved two years after arriving in the States, as my dad acquired better employment (and as you can see in the driveway, a better car).

Scrapbooking ones heritage is very different from scrapbooking a vacation, or a special event, or even daily life. There is a sense of capturing years of life in a visual time capsule. There is a sense of responsibility in presenting moments of history truthfully, but with a personal point of view. There is also a sense of pride that we feel as scrapbookers -we are family historians preserving stories that may otherwise be forgotten, and telling them in a way that will make future generations want to remember. xo -Enikö

02/17/2011

On the following pages of my Family Heritage Scrapbook, you see my complete family as we were in the 1950's. All four children are enjoying the benefits of loving grandparents, and life in Budapest. We lived on Vaci Utca, a very elegant neighborhood and had a very nice life. Behind the scenes, politically, there was a lot going on. The Hungarian youth, tired of the oppression of the oppressive communist regime and the unfair practices of the Secret Police, decided to organize a peaceful demonstration to voice thier desire for freedom of speech among other democratic freedoms. The Hungarian Revolution broke out on October 23, 1956, practically on our doorstep. A month later, after the deaths of hundreds of revolutionaries -many of them only in their teens, the aftermath of the failed revolution became a serious threat to the Farkas family. Peter, the handsome and inventive engineer, fearing that the occupying Russian communists would ship him to Moscow for his knowledge, packed up his wife Edith and their four children and set out on foot in the middle of the night to walk his family to freedom.

Naturally, there is a lot more to the story, but often in a scrapbook layout, we wish to tell the essence of the events in a more personal and concise way. (Historical details or personal accounts of the story may be included by slipping the "secret journaling" in an envelope or some other format on the page).The layout above shows the happy family as it was before the Hungarian Revolution of '56, then brings the viewer's eye to the bottom of the right-hand page, where we see a newspaper clipping of the Russian tanks that lined the Budapest streets after the revolution failed.

You can view details of the left-page scrapbook layout here:

The title "Farewell Home" hints that something is about to disrupt the harmony of this family. The journaling in the circle on the left gives us more detail. The right-hand scrapbook page below illustrates the contrast between the happy family and the war that is erupting around them:

Next to the copy of the newspaper photo (always use a copy printed on acid-free paper rather than the original, which often contains chemical residues harmful to your photographs) the journaling describes the family's plight in more detail. If you're interested, and you're having trouble reading the journaling, you can enlarge it by double-clicking on the page.

It is important to include "the good, the bad, and the ugly" when scrapbooking a family's history. Future generations will be just as interested in the difficult times...perhaps even more so...as in the happy moments of a family's heritage.

This post is particularly poignant to me at this time with all that is happening currently with the protests in the Middle East. It is easy for those that have always lived in freedom to take it for granted, but to those that live in oppression, the possible attainment of freedom is worth many sacrifices...

02/10/2011

Last week I posted pages about the boys in the Farkas family...this week is all about the girls. The layout above illustrates how eight photos can be incorporated in a single-page design without feeling crowded. Also of note: I tried something new on these pages -computer printing on ink jet transparencies. The one I used was by Avery and it is best if you print out the journaling on plain paper first to test the size and placement, then be sure to follow the package directions on which side to print on (naturally I found this out the hard way). It was a great way to include a lot of information in a limited amount of space. I also used it on the title "A Girl at Last!" for uniformity. The above layout is of yours truly and is embellished with flowers cut by hand from patterned paper from Paper Loft's Grandma's House line. Some of the flowers were enhanced with an application of Ranger's Glossy Accents, which add dimension as well as a nice shine. This is a great reminder that scrapbooking embellishments need not stress your budget. We often overlook opportunities to use images from patterned paper as fabulous and inexpensive accents to our pages. This product by Ranger is similar to glitter glue, minus the glitter. It is very easy to apply and works best when applied generously, but it is important to let it dry thoroughly (preferably overnight) before handling or slipping into a sheet protector.

As you can see below, the next page is centered around our sister, Ildi. Her page includes six photos and is designed to be compatible to the page that sits to the left of it in the Heritage Album. Many of the same elements were used on both pages to make them coherent. (She was an adorable baby, wasn't she - and a blond!)

I am particularly fond of the colors used on these pages. The Heritage Album started out in mostly brown and sepia tones to reflect the era that my parents were born in and then the couple's war-torn courtship. With the introduction of children into the mix, a little more color is added to the pages, illustrating the joy that children undoubtedly added to the family.

I hope you're enjoying this series about my family's heritage and that by now you, too, are working on your own Heritage Album. If you've enjoyed this post, please leave me a message below and do subscribe to my blog.

02/01/2011

Yes, we know what comes next in my Scrapbooking a Heritage Album series...

It was quite the challenge to fit six photos of my brother Attila on a single-page scrapbook layout and still maintain order. Notice, once again, the use of the "power of 3's"...Three large photos carry the eye to the three smaller photos, and the three journaling blocks tell the story. There are also three areas in which the striped paper was used as matting. Using 3's will not necessarily guarantee balance in scrapbooking, but when the items are placed in a harmonious way, it can create pleasing order on a layout. In the photos, we see a happy, but contemplative boy. The outfits are precious and I'm very fond of the photo of Attila being fed by his maternal grandmother, Mami at our summer cottage in Erd, Hungary. The gnome was a beloved fixture in the garden of the cottage.

Opposite the layout of Attila, my brother Csaba makes his entrance into the Heritage Album...

Here, it is the repeated use of circular images that moves the eye effortlessly from the date of Csaba's birth to his name. I chose these photos very carefully, since they needed to illustrate the relationship between the brothers without words, since I wanted to limit my journaling. In the upper left-hand corner, we see Csaba helping his older brother button his jacket. (I thought this was a particularly sweet picture.) Below that, we see the brothers hanging out their heads from our summer cottage window with mischief on their faces. The photo of Csaba in his mother's arms shows the love she felt for her beautiful toddler. The next photo shows big brother Attila coming to the defense of his little brother in a clearly protective gesture. To the right, another photo taken at the summer cottage shows the boys frolicking in their pajamas. -All together, the closeness between them is quite apparent in this layout, hence the story is told.

Details that are noteworthy in these Heritage Album scrapbook layouts:

The scroll on the upper right of Attila's page was continued from the patterned paper onto the matting with a similar rubber stamp.

A simple word such as "Cherish" or "Together" is often enough of a title to give the layout meaning and direction.

When using many photos on a layout, it is best to use embelishments sparingly, such as the copper brad which attaches the date of Csaba's birth and the ribbon that softens the look of the journaling tag, which both add interest to the layout -without distracting from the photos and the story-telling.